So, guys, what's your thoughts on buying liquor on the islands? We always bought our limit and carried it home on the plane. You would think that the vendors on these islands came up with a plan to still be able to sell to tourists. I would think that is a big part of their livelihood (sp?) Anyone's thoughts?

I agree that the new rules will probably hurt the liquor sales. The only solution aside from checking the bottles in your luggage would be to have them ship it to you, but I don't know what that does to the "duty free" aspect of it all. Luckily for me, we drive to our port, so I can still buy my limit and not worry about the airlines.

In my opinion, it's not worth the hassle to save a few bucks. If I'm not the only one thinking this way, it has to affect sales for the vendors. Just another inconvenience for everyone. Times sure are changing...

Yeah, unless the rules are relaxed I am done with buying rum in St. Thomas. This has to be ruining places like Al Cohen's Liquor and A.H. Riise. I just read a Travel Weekly article that said those two stores are packing liquor in "sturdy, airline-approved travel boxes". Of course, these boxes probably say 'steal me' to every crook standing at the carousel or in the baggage handling areas.

Probably not going to be saving much money if they start having to spend money on packaging that will survive the abuse the baggage handlers can induce upon it. I think any bag theives are looking for more marketable items to steal like cameras and jewelry to worry about stealing alcohol. I agree with SonnyV, not worth the hassle (unless you are driving to the cruise ship and don't have to worry about it)

Depends on what state you are from and what kind of liquor taxes they have. I always like to bring Kahlua back from Mexico, it's a good 50% cheaper than I can get it. Once in Ensenada I got two bottles for around $9. I think it was suppose to be $9 a piece. On my recent flight back from Amsterdam on August 14th I noticed a flight attendent going through one of her carry on bags. She had two bottles of liquor. I quess they don't have to follow the rules.

I returned from my cruise on the Valor Aug 20, which was pretty soon after the ban started. We bought a few bottles of liquor in St. Thomas.
(The same bottles were cheaper in St. Martin the next day)
The store wrapped the bottles up well and put it on a box. It took up a lot of suitcase space but it survived. We also had a bottle of Champaign..which had no box...We risked it and wrapped it in virtually ever article of clothing in the suitcase....it survived fine....The only problem was with the 7 boxes of rum balls I bought...They also had to be in the suitcase...I now have 3 boxes of crushed rumballs.